A Triumphant Christ in a God-less Culture

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This Christmas…

How did we get to this place? We’ve been barrel-aged in idolatry and self-servitude.

Consume. Consume. CONSUME!

Enjoy. Enjoy. ENJOY!

But what eternal pleasures ever came out of a glass bottle? What high has ever lifted you up to the heavens—literally?

Why does a magical blend of plastic and silicon with a retina screen attached have so much of my attention? Why do I lust for the love of this world when I’ve got the love of the One whom created it?

The reality? I was born this way. I—am a worshipper.

As the self-proclaimed atheist David Foster Wallace declares, “There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships.”

We’ve just been deceived into believing that the patterns of this world (money, power, and respect) are greater than the presence of God. We’ve fled from His holy temple—His very presence—and headed for the house of Lady Folly (Proverb 9:13-18).

On repeat like a screamo song called “GIMME MORE,” our society has successfully evolved into a “consumer society.”

And do you know why? We love to consume things. To worship things. We love the stuff.

I love the stuff.

You and I—we—are full-time worshippers.

The question is: what do you worship?

In our day and age, it seems as if the mall is the new worship center, with materialism its god.

We rush to the newest stores for the latest gifts and toys of all sorts in hopes of presenting a worthy gift or sacrifice to our loved ones (or ourselves), while forgetting the God, our Heavenly Father, who gave us the gift and sacrifice of His only begotten Son—the greatest gift. He is the reason for the season.

How can we ever forget?

I’ll tell you …

We are worshipping as we are created to worship, just not the One we are created to worship.

We’ve been blinded to this truth. Deceived.

But be deceived no more, for He has shown Himself to us, in history past, and will show Himself again on the Day to come as revealed through the Word of God. John testifies to this in his first epistle, where he recalls for his readers the Jesus that they had saw, touched, and heard (1 John 1:1-4).

This Christmas, I want to remember the Son of God, who, though fully God, came down from the heavens in the form of a man to die for you and I; that we might be reconciled to God, and restored into His image and likeness.

Then let us respond, like the wise men, whom “when they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh” (Matthew 2:10-11 ESV).

They knew what Jesus would accomplish for them, why He had come, and they responded in the only acceptable way to respond: in joyful worship and adoration.

This Christmas, let’s rejoice “exceedingly with great joy” as we have an opportunity to give our body up as a “living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God,” to bow before His throne of grace, which is what it means to worship under the revelation of the Gospel. (Romans 12:1).